Tractors and wood! Show your pics

goeduck · Nov 21, 2017

4570Man said:
I cut a load of big rounds. Loading them would have been about a hundred times easier if I still had a grapple.

Sooooooo, what would possess you to get rid of a grapple? Friendly question, just curious.

Mikejeakins · Nov 22, 2017

MossRoad said:
Year one.
I girdle the locust trees with three passes around the bark. That usually kills them in a year.

Year two I drop them, limb them, drag them to the landing, stack them up like a pile of telephone poles, and as time permits, cut them into 16" lengths. Then I split them and stack them for a year.

Burn them year three.

I suppose I could just drop em, cut em and split them all in one shot, but I'd still let them dry for two years.

One thing neat about locust is you can burn in pretty green and still get pretty decent heat. But it'll soot up your chimney pretty badly.... been there, done that, bought the chimney brushes and learned my lesson. Only dry wood.

Locust is darn dense stuff. My sassafras and cherry fires tend to burn down in about 4-5 hours. The locust will go 11-12 hours.

What kind of Locust are you cutting? A Buddy of mine just took down two Honey Locust trees and gave them to me.

MossRoad · Nov 22, 2017

Pretty sure its black locust. No thorns at all. I have about 10,000 of them. So I'll be good on the firewood for a couple years.... :laughing:

PhysAssist · Nov 22, 2017

rd_macgregor said:
Depending on how big and how seriously hung-up a tree is, sometimes a peavey or cant hook can be used to roll/rock it enough to get it to drop. I too frequently have to drop a hanger in sections, though. In awkward locations, I've occasionally had to accordion fell trees up to 8" or so...really big ones are too scary to do that, though!

I know what you mean- and in a couple of cases, in spite of trying the other methods, we really needed to rotate the tree to get it out of the "supporting tree", but hand tools were not enough, so I choked a tow strap around the trunk, and then wrapped it around it in the opposite direction from the rotation we wanted, and used either a come-along [most often], or winch [to hook onto the strap and and rotate the hung-up tree out of the canopy] anchored to a nearby tree, or rarely our little tractor with the box blade and bucket edge dug in to add traction and prevent it from getting dragged backwards toward the trees instead of rotating the tree.

It worked pretty well the several times we used it, but I forgot to mention, the butt of the tree pretty much has to be either resting on the ground or on the stump for this to work.

John_Mc · Nov 22, 2017

MossRoad said:
Pretty sure its black locust. No thorns at all. I have about 10,000 of them. So I'll be good on the firewood for a couple years.... :laughing:

BTW, in addition to being good firewood (once it dries) Black Locust is incredibly rot resistant. It makes great fence posts, or a substitute for pressure-treated lumber for outdoor structures. It lasts longer than PT in most situations.

Otto Syracuse · Nov 22, 2017

John_Mc said:
BTW, in addition to being good firewood (once it dries) Black Locust is incredibly rot resistant. It makes great fence posts, or a substitute for pressure-treated lumber for outdoor structures. It lasts longer than PT in most situations.

My horse pasture fence posts are made of black locust, extremely hard, and difficult to nail into. An impact driver and deck screws work well. The posts should last well after I am gone!

Otto Syracuse · Nov 22, 2017

MossRoad said:
Year one.
I girdle the locust trees with three passes around the bark. That usually kills them in a year.

Year two I drop them, limb them, drag them to the landing, stack them up like a pile of telephone poles, and as time permits, cut them into 16" lengths. Then I split them and stack them for a year.

Burn them year three.

I suppose I could just drop em, cut em and split them all in one shot, but I'd still let them dry for two years.

One thing neat about locust is you can burn in pretty green and still get pretty decent heat. But it'll soot up your chimney pretty badly.... been there, done that, bought the chimney brushes and learned my lesson. Only dry wood.

Locust is darn dense stuff. My sassafras and cherry fires tend to burn down in about 4-5 hours. The locust will go 11-12 hours.

Thank you. I have quite a few locust trees on my property, along with maple and cherry. It pains me to cut out a cherry or maple unless it is leaning into a field, dropped from a wind storm or too deformed to be used as lumber. We have a farm 20 miles away that has lots of beech, which makes pretty good firewood...easy to split and dries out quick. But it involves hauling, and trucks, and working off property. Ive ignored the locusts until now, but I will propably cut out a few now using your method.